III.—­The Judges at the Bar

On October 22, their acte d’accusation was read to them, and their trial began on the 26th.  Never since the Knights Templars had a party appeared more numerous, more illustrious, or more eloquent.  The renown of the accused, their long possession of power, their present danger, and that love of vengeance which arises in men’s hearts at mighty reverses of fortune, had collected a crowd in the precincts of the revolutionary tribunal.

At ten o’clock the accused were brought in.  They were twenty-two; and this fatal number, inscribed in the earliest lists of the proscription, on May 31, at eleven o’clock, entered the salle d’audience, between two files of gens d’armes, and took their places in silence on the prisoners’ bench.

Ducos was the first to take his seat:  scarcely twenty-eight years of age, his black and piercing eyes, the flexibility of his features, and the elegance of his figure revealed one of those ardent temperaments in whom everything is light, even heroism.

Mainveille followed him, the youthful deputy of Marseilles, of the same age as Ducos, and of an equally striking but more masculine beauty than Barbaroux.  Duprat, his countryman and friend, accompanied him to the tribunal.  He was followed by Duchatel, deputy of Deux Sevres, aged twenty-seven years, who had been carried to the tribunal almost in a dying state wrapped in blankets, to vote against the death of the “Tyrant,” and who was termed, from this act and this costume, the “Spectre of Tyranny.”

Carra, deputy of Saone and Loire at the Convention, sat next to Duchatel.  His vulgar physiognomy, the stoop of his shoulders, his large head and disordered attire contrasted with the beauty and stature of Duchatel Learned, confused, fanatic, declamatory, impetuous alike in attack or resistance, he had sided with the Gironde to combat the excesses of the people.

A man of rustic appearance and garb, Duperret, the involuntary victim of Charlotte Corday, sat next to Carra.  He was of noble birth, but cultivated with his own hands the small estate of his forefathers.

Gensonne followed them:  he was a man of five-and-thirty, but the ripeness of his intellect, and the resolution that dictated his opinions gave his features that look of energy and decision that belongs to maturer age.

Next came Lasource, a man of high-flown language and tragical imagination.  His unpowdered and closely-cut hair, his black coat, his austere demeanour, and grave and ascetic features, recalled the minister of the Holy Gospel and those Puritans of the time of Cromwell who sought for God in liberty, and in their trial, martyrdom.

Valaze seemed like a soldier under fire; his conscience told him it was his duty to die, and he died.

The Abbe Fauchet came immediately after Valaze.  He was in his fiftieth year, but the beauty of his features, the elevation of his stature, and the freshness of his colour, made him appear much younger.  His dress, from its colour and make, befitted his sacred profession, and his hair was so cut as to show the tonsure of the priest, so long covered by the red bonnet of the revolutionist.